The Court of International Trade has denied the amount of CBP’s 1592 penalty against a corporation for fraudulently introducing entries of primrose oil capsules into the U.S., which, at the time of import, could not be lawfully imported. CBP stated the $17.7 million penalty amount was set at double the entered value of the merchandise; however, the court concluded that CBP did not follow its regulations in arriving at this figure, and ordered CBP to arrange for a new appraisal.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has posted an updated version of its spreadsheet of ACE ESAR A2.2 (Initial Entry Types) programming issues.
The Court of International Trade has ruled against U.S. Customs and Border Protection's claim that customs broker Robert E. Landweer & Co. was liable to pay a $30,000 penalty for filing entries with incorrect dumping duty deposit rates and incorrectly identifying the supplier of the merchandise. The CIT dismissed the case as CBP did not specify the customs regulations Landweer violated and therefore failed to sufficiently exhaust administrative remedies.
Ericsson was sued by network equipment maker Airvana for $330 million, a court filing said. The suit, filed in the Supreme Court of New York, the state’s highest trial court for civil cases, accused Ericsson of misappropriating trade secrets and producing a “knock-off” version of the EV-DO system that could put the smaller company out of business. Additionally, Airvana claimed Ericsson withheld information to “induce” Airvana to grant valuable concessions and hired an Airvana software engineer in knowing violation of a non-competition agreement. Ericsson is aware of the lawsuit, a spokeswoman said. While the company won’t comment on ongoing litigation, it’s committed to supporting its customers and will take action to “protect both their interests and those of Ericsson,” she said. Accordingly, the company will “vigorously defend our right to deploy the Ericsson EV-DO Global System in customer networks according to existing commitments,” she said. Nortel, before it was acquired by Ericsson, had licensed the EV-DO technology from Airvana. According to the lawsuit, Ericsson sought to renegotiate its licensing agreements with Airvana shortly after the Nortel acquisition closed. The lawsuit claimed Ericsson soon started to develop an EV-DO platform using Airvana’s technology.
The International Trade Administration has made a preliminary affirmative determination of critical circumstances in the countervailing duty investigation of crystalline silicon photovoltaic cells (solar cells), whether or not assembled into modules, from China (C-570-980).
The International Trade Administration has initiated administrative reviews for certain firms subject to antidumping or countervailing duty orders with December anniversary dates. The ITA has also received requests to revoke two of these orders for six firms. The ITA intends to issue the final results of these reviews not later than December 31, 2012.
The Consumer Product Safety Commission has posted the comments it received on its request for ideas on ways to reduce the cost of the Consumer Product Safety Improvement Act (CPSIA) third-party testing requirements for children's products that are consistent with assuring compliance with any applicable consumer product safety rule, ban, standard, or regulation. Suggestions include advising retailers that no preference should be accorded to one accredited test lab over another, harmonizing standards internationally, recognizing products tested by other government agencies, a de minimis exception, among others.
Broker Power is providing readers with some of the top stories for January 23-27, 2012 in case they were missed last week.
U.S. Customs and Border Protection has posted an updated version of its spreadsheet of ACE ESAR A2.2 (Initial Entry Types) programming issues.
House Ways and Means Committee Chairman Camp (R-MI) has issued a statement welcoming the decision by the Court of Appeals for the Federal Circuit to grant an extension for filing a rehearing request in the ongoing litigation about the application of the countervailing duty laws to non-market economies (NMEs) such as China. Camp stated that the Administration must pursue all available legal avenues to overturn the underlying decision, which he believes was wrongly decided.